This year as every year the Torah portion of Beshalach comes out in parallel with the holiday of Tu B’Shvat. There are in fact many beautiful and deep allusions to Tu B’Shvat, the new year of the trees, in the portion.
After experiencing the miraculous salvation while crossing the Reed Sea, the Jewish people traveled three days without water. When they finally found water it was bitter and they could not drink it. God then revealed a tree to Moses which he threw into the water sweetening the waters. God then tells the people that if they listen to His voice all the diseases of Egypt will not be put upon them for “I am God that heals you” (Exodus 15:26)
The tree which Moses threw into the water to sweeten them alludes to the Tree of Life as it says: It [the Torah] is a Tree of Life for those who grasp onto it” (Proverbs 3:18). This tree is further connected to God’s promise to heal the people: “I have created the evil inclination and Torah as an antidote.” Similar to the Torah which both sweetens reality and has spiritual, psychological and emotional healing qualities, trees serve the same purpose in a physical manner by providing us with shade, beauty, healing barks, roots and leaves, as well as sweet, nourishing fruits.
The Baal Shem Tov explains, based on the grammar of the verse, that it was the people who were actually bitter, therefore they experienced the water as bitter. After leaving the miracles of the Sea they found themselves without water. Perhaps they expected that after such miracles life would continue that way forever and it was a bitter pill to swallow that it was not so.
Our Sages, who also relate any reference to water as alluding to Torah, explain the people were still so involved in thinking about the physical booty they collected at the sea that it distracted them from Torah and more spiritual matters, which then created their own bitter state of being. The tree, symbolizing Torah, being thrown into the water alludes to how Torah can bring us back to a balanced reality between the physical and the spiritual.
Immediately after this incident the Torah relates that they traveled and camped in Elim, where there were twelve springs of water and seventy date palms. Rashi quoting the Mechilta relates the twelve springs to the twelve tribes and the seventy date palms to the seventy elders. After learning the lesson of the bitter waters the people were given the chance to experience the joys of the Torah, a virtual oasis in the desert of life when lived without Torah.
The seventy date palm trees symbolize the seventy “faces” or perspectives of Torah that are revealed to those who eat of its fruit. Seventy is also the numerical value of the word sod, secret, the inner Kabbalisitc dimension of Torah.
The date palm further symbolizes the tzadik, the righteous person, of which it is said: “The righteous like the date palm will flourish” (Psalms 92) and “and your people are all righteous, they shall inherit the land forever” (Isaiah 60:21).
Of all the fruits dates are among the very highest on the glycimic scale measuring natural sugar content. Dates only grow in hot climates with abundant sun. The process of photosynthesis, by which a plant takes the light of the sun and converts it into life force and eventually fruit, can teach us how we can take the light of God and Torah and transform it into our deepest being.
The word for date, tamar, equals 640, the same as the word for sun, shemesh!! When we receive the light of God and Torah, devoid of ego and ulterior motives, we become clear vessels for turning that light into the very blood that flows in our veins. This is similar to a date tree that is a pure conduit for transforming the energy of the sun into pure sweetness.
Another subtle connection between this portion and Tu B’Shvat is not as obvious as the above examples, yet it answers a much asked question as to why the story of the ten plagues and the exodus from Egypt happens in the winter and not in the spring at the time of Pesach.
According to tradition sap begins to ascend once again in the trees on Tu B’shvat. This sap is the life force that will culminate in the spring and summer with buds, leaves and fruit. Therefore Tu B’Shvat is considered from a spiritual perspective as the time when new redemptive energy begins to well up beneath the surface.
This redemptive energy is related to the fact that Tu B’Shvat is on the full moon of the month of Shvat. A month later on the full moon is Shushan Purim, followed one month later by the full moon of Pesach. The sap that begins to rise in the trees on Tu B’Shvat manifests itself fully in the spring and at Pesach. This then is the inner connection with this portion always coming out at the time of Tu B’Shvat.
Another connection between these three holidays is that not only do they occur three months in a row on the full moon, but they all have in common the drinking of wine. The Seder of Tu B’Shvat created by the Kabbalists of Safed is ordered around four cups of wine, just as the Seder of Pesach. Drinking wine is also the center focus of the festivities of Purim.
Wine has the numeric value of seventy, as does the word sod, secret, as alluded to in the seventy date palms of this portion. Delving into the inner dimensions of Torah opens up deep secrets hidden within, releasing redemptive energy in the world, just as the sap rising in the trees on Tu B’Shvat will culminate in new life and growth.
